


Problems & Paradoxes

by shatteredhourglass



Series: a perfectly normal clint barton au [2]
Category: Hawkeye (Comics), Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fae, Alternate Universe - Urban Fantasy, Bucky Barnes Has Issues, Clint: what if i wasn't human... haha unless?, FDR gets tagged in everything so i can find him, M/M, Mystery, POV Bucky Barnes, Very Mild Fantasy Horror, mild descriptions of gore
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-03
Updated: 2020-10-03
Packaged: 2021-03-07 23:55:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,161
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26776237
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shatteredhourglass/pseuds/shatteredhourglass
Summary: Bucky's seeing things. Weird, inexplicable things in places they're not supposed to be.Clint's doing things. Weird, inexplicable things that normal people don't do.At least he hasn't gone back to that shop.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Clint Barton
Series: a perfectly normal clint barton au [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1920214
Comments: 40
Kudos: 177





	Problems & Paradoxes

**Author's Note:**

  * For [GreyishBlue](https://archiveofourown.org/users/GreyishBlue/gifts).



> This is a series now! Everyone say thank you to Bobbi. (Now I feel like I need to make a third one. I probably won't.) Bobbi, I hope this is enjoyable. Please don't tell me if it's not, I'd rather remain oblivious.
> 
> I've been kinda slow on the updates lately and I do apologize, but the muse is returning to me slowly and I should be coming out with some new things fairly soon. I'm sorry for my absence.

Bucky doesn’t sleep that night.

Not well, anyway.

It’s a mix of the usual dull ache of pain and the events of last night still leaving his heart rattling in his chest, along with a healthy dose of sharing a bed with a strange man. The bed is a lot warmer than his threadbare mattress - probably also to do with previously mentioned strange man, who thankfully stays on his own side of the bed but still radiates enough heat that Bucky’s reluctantly comfortable.

He refuses to sleep. 

Clint's foot touches his.

He does close his eyes at one point simply to rest them, and when he opens them again there’s sunlight filtering through the floor-to-ceiling windows of the bedroom.

It stings.

He closes his eyes again.

"Morning," Clint greets when Bucky finally works up the energy to roll off of the mattress. 

"Ugh," is all Bucky can manage to say to that. Yes, it _is_ morning, but he sure wishes it wasn't. 

It's just starting to hit him how close he was to dying - or worse - last night. Every time he exhales it sounds like the woman from last night is whispering in his ear, too quiet to make out words. There’s dried blood on his hand where he’d missed washing it off last night and his head feels like someone’s been drilling into the bone. He’s still wearing Clint’s hoodie.

(It smells nice.)

Clint gets up from where he’s perched on the windowsill - it looks like he was watching something outside; birds, maybe - and heads over to the jug of water sitting on a desk with two mugs next to it. It looks largely unused, and Clint has to wipe dust out of the mugs with his shirt. “Feeling okay?”

“No,” Bucky says, brutally honest.

How could anyone feel okay after that?

It earns him a laugh, at least. “Fair enough. You don’t feel like you’ve been cursed or anything, though? No blood from your eyes, urge to nail my hands to the wall and paint the room with my blood?”

“I don’t think you’d know if you were curs-” Bucky starts, and then realizes it was a joke. Shit. He used to be funny, didn’t he?

“Here,” Clint says, apparently unbothered by Bucky’s complete ineptitude. “I hate water, but apparently it’s good for you.”

“Apparently,” Bucky repeats glumly, but he takes the mug.

Clint sits back in his spot on the windowsill and neatly folds his legs up underneath him. How he manages it when there’s so much of him and so little space on the sill, Bucky doesn’t know. The water is lukewarm when he takes a cautious sip, but there’s nothing bad about it.

Hopefully, anyway.

“I like it better out here,” Clint says, looking out the window. “’s peaceful.”

He didn’t have a shadow.

“Why’re you looking at the water like it’s come out of the turtle pond at Central Park?”

“No reason,” Bucky says immediately. “It’s nothing. Sorry.”

“Don’t know why you’re apologizing for that,” Clint responds, picking at something on his jeans. “If anything you should be apologizing for the bedhead.”

Bucky balances the mug between his knees and absently pats down part of his hair. He can feel it sticking up in places awkwardly and he’s momentarily embarrassed until he notices the faint smile on Clint’s lips.

Right. Joking. Normal people do that.

“People in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones,” he mutters, glancing at the haystack sitting on top of Clint’s head. Really, it’s far too late for a witty comeback and it’s got to be glaringly obvious that he doesn’t interact with people too much anymore, but the words still cause Clint’s smile to brighten.

“Yeah, well,” Clint says. “I’m going for a look here, alright? If I looked all clean and wholesome in my civilian gear, people’d mistake me for Steve.”

“You don’t look like Steve. You look - I don’t know. More normal.”

“I’m going to assume that’s a compliment. If it isn’t, don’t tell me.”

Technically it was just an observation. Bucky complies anyway, because even if Clint’s not the flawless kind of attractive the way Steve is, there’s something instantly comfortable about being in his presence. Normal is good. Normal is certainly a bonus after coming into close contact with the fae and surviving.

Of course, he’d only survived _because_ of Clint.

“Thank you,” Bucky says. “I - for last night. I would’ve regretted it.”

Clint waves him off. “I gotta ask, though. What the hell made you think that was a good idea?”

“I knew it was a bad idea,” Bucky admits, setting the mug aside and drawing his knees up to his chest. He doesn’t want to talk about it - doesn’t want to _think_ about it, even, but he supposes the explanation is deserved here. “I didn’t care. I’m so tired all the time. Everything feels so much harder than it used to and I thought I’d be okay with it when they discharged me from the hospital, but…”

“Real world’s a bitch,” Clint says succinctly.

Yeah, that’s about it.

“The doorbell rang when I was taking a shower and I couldn’t wrap the towel around myself to answer it,” Bucky says. It seems stupid now. He’d just been so frustrated about everything, about being let go from his job and forced to sit through a speech by the mayor about heroism while everyone ogled his shoulder and just _life_ in general.

Clint doesn’t seem to have anything to say to that and Bucky’s weirdly relieved, because most people would’ve busted out the _I’m sorry_ or the pitying looks right now.

He hates the apologizing most of all.

“Hey, you want breakfast? They leave us stuff downstairs,” Clint supplies. “JARVIS makes a mean stack of pancakes.”

“I’ll take a coffee,” Bucky says, setting down the mug of water.

“A man after my own heart. Right this way, Mister Barnes.”

He’s not sure how he feels about the _Mister Barnes_ part, but he definitely needs that coffee.

It occurs to him once they get downstairs that he’s just shared more about his struggles with Hawkeye than he has with anyone else in his life. Wow. His social life deteriorates more and more with each day, doesn’t it? What a mess.

On the other hand, Clint’s the only person who hasn’t acted weird about the arm. No wonder Bucky feels more relaxed around him.

_Is_ that why Bucky feels more relaxed around him? Or is it something more sinister than that? He looks down at his hand for some unknown reason and realizes the wounds from where Amora’s pen had stabbed him have shrunk overnight. Now there’s only a collection of faint red marks on his skin that he can barely see.

“Sugar?”

“What? No,” Bucky manages, still caught up in his thoughts.

“I’ll be back in a sec,” Clint says, but Bucky barely registers him moving away. The whole thing feels like a terrible dream and he doesn’t know where Clint fits into it, or what the hell is going on with him.

Maybe he’s just overreacting.

Could be the trauma, after all. The post-traumatic-whatever that the doctors talked about while Bucky ignored them profusely. It's been months since that was brought up, though. He puts his hand back down by his side again and glances around to try and locate Clint. How does a guy that’s over six feet disappear like that?

"Buck? What're you doing here?"

Uh oh.

Bucky hopes that its his ears playing tricks on him but sure enough, when he turns his head there’s Steve approaching him in full Captain America gear, a faintly concerned look on his face. It’s too late to run for it - it’s not like Steve wouldn’t catch him anyway. Shit. Fuck.

“Bucky,” Steve says. “Hello?”

“I heard you the first time,” Bucky answers irritably.

“Sorry. Do you need some help with anything?”

_I need a lobotomy_ , he thinks bleakly. Doesn’t say it out loud, though. It wouldn’t get him anything except for a nicely large-sized helping of guilt. “No. It’s fine.”

Steve runs a hand through his hair and tips his head to the side, calculating. If only he was as dense as he pretends to be. “What are you doing here, then?”

Bucky’d get away with a lot more if he did. “Maybe I just wanted to hang out. You got a problem with that, punk?”

“I told you I was going away last week,” Steve says. “How’d you know I got back early?”

"I, uh," Bucky says. 

He tries to think of an excuse. Nothing's coming to mind. Goddamnit. Steve's frowning, and Bucky's scrambling for some reason to be here at seven in the morning with what's clearly yesterday's clothes and someone else’s hoodie on. 

The easiest excuse would be to pretend he’d had a panic attack or something similar but lying about those leaves a bad taste in his mouth. Not to mention he’d rather shoot himself than look any more helpless than he does already.

Clint chooses that moment to reappear because _of course_ he does, passing a gently steaming cup from the coffee machine into Bucky's hand. He's put a little cozy on it so that it doesn't burn Bucky's fingers and Bucky stares at that for a moment, puzzled by the thoughtfulness of it. 

"Clint," Steve says, something off in the tone of his voice. "You were with Bucky?"

"Sure was," Clint answers cheerfully. ”All night.”

Ah, fuck. Now Clint's going to tell him that Bucky's been wandering around trying to strike up a deal with the fae and Steve’s going to make that disappointed face for the next thousand years. Is there an open window nearby? Can he jump out of it quickly enough that no one will catch him? 

Probably not. Fucking superheroes.

"We had fun," Clint says, and Bucky tries not to jump as Clint's hand settles on his hip, fingers tucked into his belt loop comfortably. ”Didn’t we, Bucket?”

“If that’s gonna be a running gag with you, I’m leaving right now.”

Steve's frown deepens. ”And when were you planning on telling me about this… _this_?”

Why is he saying it in that tone of voice?

“We’re entitled to privacy, Steve-o,” Clint says smoothly. “What Bucky and I do behind closed doors isn’t any of your business - unless you want to join in? Because I’m open to that, but I don’t know about Bucky.”

“I’m going to pretend I didn’t have this conversation,” Steve says, looking a little strained. “Buck, if you want to hang out later, just let me know.”

_Oh_. Steve thinks they're fucking. 

Bucky watches him walk off with his palm pressed to his forehead like even the idea of the two of them having sex gives him a migraine. He’s not sure why it warrants that kind of reaction, but it’s pretty amusing. Poor Steve. Bucky’s going to have to invite him over once the guilt of last night has waned.

“Thanks for the save,” he says to Clint, once he’s sure Steve’s out of earshot.

"I'm not a snitch," Clint replies with a shrug, stepping away from him. Immediately Bucky starts to feel colder and he has to stop himself from edging back into Clint’s space. "'sides, doesn't hurt _my_ reputation if there's a rumour I'm sleeping with Steve's hot new BFF."

Hot.

“Ha ha,” Bucky says dryly, takes a sip of his coffee. What a joke. He’s pretty sure he looks like that girl from The Grudge at the moment, pale and messy-haired and with that bland thousand-mile stare he always catches himself doing in the mirror.

“Barton! We’re heading out,” a stern-looking woman in black says as she strides past.

“Shit,” Clint says. “I gotta go. You gonna be okay to get home on your own?”

“I’m fine,” Bucky responds. Even if he wasn’t, he wouldn’t say anything. But he’s feeling a little better underneath all the embarrassment and regret, and maybe he’ll make it a few more days before the next inevitable bad move. “So you’re not gonna tell Steve?”

“Nah. I do have one condition though,” Clint says.

Uh oh.

“What is it?”

“Don’t look at me like that, it’s not anything horrible,” Clint says. “I just want to make sure I’m not gonna have to yank you out of somewhere worst next time. The one condition is if you’re feeling bad and it’s getting too much, you call me before you do anything stupid.”

“Before? Implying you’d still let me do the stupid thing?”

“If it’s not too stupid, I’ll come with you,” Clint answers with a shrug.

It sounds more like he’s trying to be Bucky’s _friend_ rather than actual blackmail, and that’s exactly what’s so disarming about it. Bucky doesn’t like it. (He likes it too much.) He’s got to keep his wits about him. Even when Clint’s smiling at him like that, a little lopsided and charming.

He doesn’t _look_ dangerous.

Bucky’s gaze slides down to the floor underneath Clint’s socked feet. For some reason he’s wearing rainbow toe-socks, but the floor is darkened in places where a shadow is supposed to be. It’s exactly the way it should be, with nothing out of place.

Did he imagine it after all?

It’s certainly possible for a stress-induced hallucination to occur, considering the night he’d had.

“Bucky?”

“What? Oh - yeah, sure. Whatever.”

It’s not like he can resist anyway; he doesn’t _think_ Clint will tell on him to Steve, but it’s a risk. He can put up with some light babysitting if it ensures Steve never finds out about his immense fuck-up.

As Bucky’s reciting his number by memory to an attentive Clint, he realizes this is the first time in months he’s given someone who wasn’t a medical health professional his number. And here he was, thinking it’d be a Grindr hookup.

(He tried Grindr once after the accident. The first match had asked him about the arm and he’d uninstalled immediately after throwing up at the thought of talking about it.)

“-and I really think you could benefit from talking to people who aren’t Steve Rogers. There’s a group session hosted down at the VA for people affected by the Ultron incident on Thursdays at three and I’m sure they’d be happy to take you in even though your circumstances were slightly different…”

The therapist’s words fade out into white noise and Bucky thinks about spending the rest of his day watching shitty cooking shows on his laptop. Coming to these appointments every two weeks is exhausting, despite the fact they’re only an hour long and he mostly ignores whatever the woman says.

He thinks Steve would be disappointed in him, maybe, but he doesn’t want to be here and he’s stubborn as all hell about shutting out the white walls and constant barrage of bland positivity quotes.

If he stops showing up, the therapist will probably tell on him.

God, he wishes he could drink with his medication. He’s seriously considering doing it anyway, but it doesn’t seem worth the drama. Alcohol never really made him feel any better anyway.

“James. _James_.”

He blinks, rubs at his eyes. “What?”

“Our session is over,” the therapist says gently. No matter how much he tries to piss her off, it isn’t working. “Would you like me to call for an Uber so you can get home safely?”

“I’m fine,” Bucky says stiffly, pushing up from the armchair he’s been slumped in for the last hour. His knees protest but he manages to get upright without falling on his ass or anything equally upsetting, after which he heads straight for the door without so much as a goodbye.

Ah, freedom.

The streets are remarkably empty for a Tuesday afternoon. Bucky enjoys the silence, tucks his hand into the pocket of his jacket and looks up at the greying sky. It’s going to rain soon, he’s guessing, but hopefully that won’t happen until he’s safely out of the way of the water. Nothing worse than wet clothes, except for trying to peel said wet clothes off of your body.

Bucky turns down an alleyway to make a shortcut and then stops in his tracks.

There’s a pair of people tucked into a shadowy corner and that in itself isn’t strange - nor is the soft, wet-sounding gasps he can hear from the man braced against the brick wall, because public sex is just a thing that happens around here. Bucky’s been an accidental voyeur more than once and usually he’ll just find another way around, because there’s plenty of back alleys and fences to jump even one-handed.

This time’s different.

This time Bucky’s eyes are fixed on the person pinning the first man against the wall, because as he watches their nails twist into sharp, golden claws and their hair twine around the man’s skin like it’s alive, and their mouth opens to reveal nothing at all.

He feels cold.

Did he take a wrong turn? 

No, he's been here before. 

Bucky must make a noise, give some indication of his presence - he can’t hear it over the blistering sound of his own shock, but the man’s eyes slide open and look at him for just a second, making eye contact.

The man smiles at him as blood starts leaking out his nose, and Bucky flees.

What the fuck. What the _fuck_ did he just see?

He scrambles down the street and into a marketplace with far more people than he’s comfortable with being around but he’s so desperate to escape that it barely registers as he weaves past a group and nearly trips over an elderly woman half his size.

“Sorry,” he manages, and then realizes that her walking stick is a snake.

There's no way. Bucky's hand aches. Immediately he starts noticing other people; a person tucking away a bag filled with glowing pink orbs, a cage filled with black goo that keeps shifting and bubbling, a snake with human hands. Oh, what the fuck?

He’s fleeing again even before the woman has a chance to reply and then he spots a McDonald’s sitting across the road.

It’s something _normal_.

Bucky makes a beeline for it. He ignores the people at the counter - there’s probably something off about them too, what’s wrong with him? - and instead pushes his way into the men’s bathroom, stumbles into a stall and struggles to breathe.

All of a sudden he feels trapped and frozen just like he was in that store, and all he can do is curl himself into the tiny space between the toilet and the wall. Like that’s going to protect him somehow, even though he knows it won’t.

He scrambles for his seldom-used mobile phone and taps the command to activate the voice assistant, tries to suck enough air into his abused lungs to get the words out. “Call Clint Barton.”

There’s a long pause and Bucky’s left listening to the heavy thudding of his own heart trying to break out of his chest. It’s too much, too soon, and there’s only one person he can actually _talk to_ about this.

“Calling Clint Barton,” the automated voice says, and Bucky starts breathing again.

It takes a second for the other end to pick up.

“’llo? Bucket?”

“I need your help,” Bucky says.

“I hope you know I’m craving fries now,” Clint says, sliding into the stall. He locks the door behind him and Bucky wonders why _he_ hadn’t thought of doing that when he’d shut himself in here. “You’re encouraging bad habits, Bucket.”

Bucky musters up an unimpressed scowl, although Clint doesn’t seem particularly cowed by it.

The cramped bathroom stall is nowhere near large enough to fit two full-sized men, and neither of them are actually _small_ by any definition of the word. Somehow Clint manages to fold himself down into the space that’s left between Bucky’s knees, one hand braced on the toilet lid. _Circus brat_ , Bucky remembers vaguely from a text conversation they'd had. He’s also wearing his mission gear.

Bucky wonders if he’d interrupted anything important. Clint wouldn’t be here if he had, right?

“Feeling okay?”

“Not really,” Bucky admits.

“Fair enough,” Clint says, reaches out one-handed and then stops. “You mind?”

“I - no, you’re… you’re fine.”

“Alright.”

Bucky lets Clint tilt his face to the side, registers the roughness of his fingers when they slide up Bucky’s cheekbones. He produces a flashlight from somewhere and shines it into Bucky’s eyes for a second, eliciting a hiss from Bucky.

“Well, you seem okay,” Clint says, leaning back. “Maybe a panic attack. But I’m not a doctor. I’ve got no idea, really. Are you sure I can’t call Bruce? He’ll be nice about it, I promise. His hands are nice and warm even when he’s Hulked out.”

“No doctors,” Bucky manages.

“Alright, alright. Here, let me help you up - how the hell’d you get all those muscles crammed into that tiny space? What got you so messed up, anyway?”

“It’s… it’s nothing,” Bucky says, accepts the hand Clint offers to help him up. “Think I’m imagining things.”

“Happens to the best of us,” Clint tells him. “You want to get a burger while we’re here?”

“I just want to go home,” Bucky says, suddenly exhausted. How many times is Clint going to have to rescue him from himself, exactly? This time wasn’t really his fault, but still. He needs his bed even more desperately than he did at the beginning of the day.

As Clint’s opening the door to the bathroom, the lights catch on his hair.

The soft gold looks almost iridescent from this angle, little shimmers of blue and green and pink dancing in front of Bucky’s eyes. He blinks and it’s gone, though, so he swallows past the nerves and keeps walking.

The McDonald’s employees ignore them completely and Bucky wonders if that’s Clint’s doing, whether he said anything before he came into the bathroom.

“It’s a good thing you’re okay with cramped spaces,” Clint’s saying. “I stole Kate’s car and I’m fairly sure it was constructed with Scott in mind, it’s tiny as hell.”

Bucky’s only half-listening to him as he edges around the cluster of tables and steps over a Happy Meal toy that someone’s left on the floor. A flicker of _something_ out of the corner of his eye makes him stop and turn his head, but when he looks it’s just a man in a green coat coming out of the back area of the store.

God, he really is going nuts, isn’t he?

“You like music?”

“What?”

“Music,” Clint repeats. “Any preferences?”

“No,” Bucky says blandly, taking a seat in the passenger’s side and turning so he can stare out the window. The street looks perfectly normal now, and he can see the markets across the road. There’s nothing there that catches his eye, no sign of anything out of the ordinary.

Clint backs the car out of the parking area. Bucky keeps his eyes on the scenery just to make sure that nothing changes. He’s still not entirely sure if he hallucinated it or not - seems strange to be imagining things like that, but people hallucinate after traumatic events. After what happened with Amora, it’d make sense for him to be nervous about the fae creeping into his life.

Serves him right for messing with things he shouldn’t be messing with, really.

“Hey, Carly Rae Jepsen,” Clint says, apparently unaware of Bucky’s inner lament. “Sweet.”

“You have awful taste in music,” Bucky responds absently. He glances sideways at Clint and notices his hair is normal now. No fancy lights or unnerving changes. He checks for shadows as well - exactly where it’s supposed to be.

Yep, time to lock himself in his apartment for a few weeks.

_I don’t understand why we can’t just meet at my place,_ Bucky types out to Steve.

The message says it’s been read, but all he gets back is directions to the basement floor of the Avengers Compound. It’s damn suspicious, is what it is.

Bucky sighs and tucks his phone back into the pocket of his jeans anyway. He trusts Steve enough to feel like this isn’t going to be something truly nightmarish, although he’s still wary. It’s been a good week of avoiding everyone and everything except for the online classes he’s been struggling with and Miles from down the hall, whose mother sends him leftovers sometimes.

This invite from Steve was anticipated - he’d hoped it’d be somewhere more comfortable than the Compound, but Steve’s a busy guy. Bucky can put up with it just this once, if only for his sake.

The elevator doesn’t work when he prods the button and it takes him a few seconds to notice the ‘Out Of Order’ sign stuck to it. Fuck. He hates stairs.

“I’m seriously reconsiderin’ our friendship, Rogers,” he calls when he gets to the bottom of the stairs. Some kind of laboratory, looks like. “Gonna trade you in for those college kids in my building who keep doing science in the middle of the night.”

“You’re not very nice to a guy who pays your rent.”

Bucky twitches and just barely manages to avoid kicking the dark-haired man that appears from underneath a machine near his feet. It’d be hard not to recognize Tony Stark even with the smears of grease and the weird green goggles on his face - Bucky still wishes he could.

“He bought the apartment,” Bucky says. “So technically he’s just my landlord. Where is he?”

“Out on a mission,” Tony replies, sitting up. “I hacked his phone. Sit down.”

“I’d rather not,” Bucky says.

“Someone mentioned you might be looking for a new arm,” Tony says, which gets Bucky’s attention immediately.

“You can do that?”

“Not yet,” Tony responds, waving a hand at him as he wanders over to a stack of boxes and starts rummaging around. Bucky stays where he is. “To have it be an actual arm - to make that kind of connection to your brain, it’s going to take me a while. Maybe a couple of weeks.”

“Right,” Bucky says. Tries not to be disappointed. Two weeks for groundbreaking technology in prosthetics is pretty fantastic - not to mention he doubts he’ll be paying anything for it, but the idea of waiting still grates at him.

“How do you feel about colours? Red and gold?”

“Fuck no.”

“Don’t tell me you want it in black, Buckaroo,” Tony says. “You’re killing my creative spirit. Here, take this for now.”

Bucky barely manages to grab onto the tote bag that’s shoved in his direction. “What is it?”

“Some extra help,” Tony says. “Make sure to pat him at least once a day or he gets sad.”

What the fuck?

“Okay, we’re done here. JARVIS has taken all the scans we’ll need to make the size and shape accurate, I’ll text you when I’m all done with the arm.”

There’s hardly even an opportunity to feel violated about the idea of Stark’s fancy computer scanning him while he stood there because Tony’s already herding him back to the stairs like an overenthusiastic sheepdog. Bucky’s got to focus his attention on not dropping the tote bag and its surprisingly heavy contents, and then somehow he’s back in the lobby again.

Jesus. He’s got no clue how Steve deals with that guy.

May as well go home again, he supposes. No point in hanging around if Steve isn’t here.

He could go see Clint.

He _could_ , but then he’d have to admit that he likes being around Clint for the hell of it and not just because Clint is keeping his secrets for him. The constant late-night phone calls are bad enough. He’s not entirely ready to admit that to Clint, and especially not to himself. All the other problems aside, it’s silly to expect anything from a guy that’s just doing his job.

Doesn’t stop Bucky from thinking about that smile, though.

It’s by mistake that he notices the hole in the hedge while he’s walking to the gate, but approaching the gap is intentional. The oddness of it strikes him - Stark doesn’t seem like the type of person to skimp on gardening, and Bucky barely manages to sidestep the neat circle of daisies in front of the gap.

There’s nothing but a brick wall, of course, and Bucky doesn’t know why he’d thought there’d be anything different.

He’s definitely losing it. Time to go home.

It’s when he turns that he sees a familiar shape leaning up against a struggling oak tree, arms folded across his chest and an uncharacteristically serious look on his face.

Clint’s turned to the side so he can’t see Bucky, facing another person with shoulder-length dark hair and an outfit that looks to be made entirely of green scales. Seeing them, Bucky’s hit with that acute sense of _off_ that’s becoming far too familiar and it becomes obvious why when he realizes the scales aren’t clothes.

There’s no way he’s hallucinating again.

Which means Clint is almost certainly having a casual talk with a fae right in the middle of the Avengers Compound gardens.

Clint’s saying something that he’s too far away to hear, lips tugged down into a frown. Whatever he tells the other person earns him an amused smirk and an eyeroll. They lean into Clint’s space and Bucky stays where he is as he watches their black-painted lips brush Clint’s ear, whispering something to him.

That’s very close. It’s almost _intimate_ , and Bucky’s taking a step back in the direction of the path before he’s even consciously decided to. He’s unsettled by the scene in front of him, faintly reminded of the man he’d seen the other week, after the therapist.

Too late he notices the blade in the fae’s long white fingers.

Bucky’s frozen - doesn’t even think about running this time, his eyes fixed in horror on the fae curled close to Clint like they’re familiar with each other, like they’ve been closer before. The knife seems to glow in the faded sunlight and then it’s being angled carefully, the wicked point aimed directly between Clint’s ribs where his faded t-shirt isn’t _quite_ strong enough to protect him.

The fae stabs him and Bucky can’t even cry out for help.

He’s stuck watching as the fae’s lips curve into a satisfied grin, and then they pull back and start walking towards Bucky.

“Thinks he can tell me what to do. _I_ am a prince,” the fae says, incredulity in their voice as they stride past Bucky like he isn’t even there. “Utterly disgraceful.”

When Bucky returns his attention to Clint - mentally preparing himself to call an ambulance, Tony Stark, someone that can help even though he knows that’s a killing blow - it’s to see Clint grimacing like he’s been mildly inconvenienced, twisting around awkwardly to try and see the knife. It’s buried up to the hilt and there’s no way it could’ve missed.

There’s no way, except Clint’s started pulling it out with one hand and he looks far too indifferent for someone who was just mortally wounded. The red patch on his shirt is spreading. Clint just looks down at the knife and wipes the blood off on his jeans.

He doesn’t notice Bucky.

Bucky’s got to get out of here.

“Hey, Mister Barnes,” Miles says. “My dad made pastelon. I was taking some up to Peter while we study - did you want a Tupperware?”

“Sure,” Bucky answers distractedly, lifting the flap of his satchel so Miles can deposit the food. He’s going to have to make it up to Rio and Jefferson one of these days - they practically keep the whole building fed, considering the rest of them are twenty-somethings who barely interact with society and subsist on two-minute noodles.

“Do I want to know what you’re doing?”

“No,” Bucky says. “Keep moving.”

“Okay, okay. There’s a weird guy downstairs looking for you, by the way,” Miles says. “I think my dad’s letting him up once he’s finished with the interrogation.”

“What? Kid, I don’t-” but he’s already gone upstairs.

Bucky lets out a sigh.

Weird guy. That could be anyone. It’s probably not Steve, but Jefferson would know who Steve is anyways. Same with Tony Stark. Which pretty much leaves two options; it actually _is_ a weird guy that he doesn’t know and Bucky’s in trouble, or it’s the only other person he’s been talking to regularly.

Either way, he’s going to pretend he isn’t here.

He stands up from where he’s been crouched by the window for the better part of the day - keeping an eye out for anything out of the ordinary, and he’d gotten a notepad to take notes but trying to brace it against his knee and write legibly turned out to be more effort than he’d anticipated. Instead he’s been using his phone for audio notes on the woman with the stick-like legs and the person who was more shadow than flesh.

It’s been a long day.

It’s been a long _week_ , and apparently now he just sees things that he isn’t supposed to see.

He can only hope it’s not the fae coming to get him.

Alpine, being Alpine, immediately starts screaming when Bucky slips in through the front door.

“Shh,” he hisses at her.

That only incurs more of her tiny wrath and her noises rise in volume as he tries to get the door locked behind him. Because the gods hate him, he fumbles his keys and drops them instead of getting them in the lock, and he can’t quite stop the torrent of swearwords that get louder as he crouches down to retrieve them.

It’s made worse when the unlocked door is opened from the other side and hits him in the side of the head.

“ _Fuck_ ,” he says, too loud to pretend he isn’t home, grabs for the side of his aching skull.

“Shit. Are you okay?”

The muffled voice on the other side of the door is unmistakable, and Bucky knows he’s not going to be able to escape an Avenger easily. May as well accept his fate and if he dies, he dies. Knowledge always pays a price, although he would’ve liked to have seen that arm Tony’s making.

Bucky opens the door and Clint’s standing there, looking as awkward and messy and _normal_ as he always does. He’s wearing a sweater with _Vote for Pedro_ printed on the front and it’s slightly too small for him; there’s a sliver of tanned skin revealed where the hem doesn’t quite reach his jeans. It’s endearing, and then Bucky remembers blood and silver and suddenly it’s not.

“Hey,” Clint says.

“Hi,” is all he can manage.

Clint shifts on his feet. “Can I come in?”

Bucky steps out of the way and then remembers that his cat is still yowling in the background like someone’s tried to cut her tail off. Clint moves past him and looks around curiously, obviously trying to pinpoint the source of the noise.

“What’re you doing here, Clint?”

“I was getting worried,” comes the faintly distracted answer.

Bucky lets out a tiny sigh of relief that he hopes Clint can’t pick up - of course he can’t pick it up, his hearing isn’t - unless that was a lie? Why would someone lie about being disabled, though? ( _Why would someone lie about being human_ , a tiny voice in his head whispers.)

“Thought the fae might’ve gotten you,” Clint says. “Can’t have that.”

“I’m fine,” Bucky answers blandly. Tries to keep any sort of inflection out of his voice. He’s not sure if Clint knows he saw what he saw, and if he doesn’t and he finds out, there’s no telling what he might do to keep it a secret.

“I’m glad,” Clint says, soft and a little affectionate. It’s enough to get Bucky’s heart beating a little faster and he’s got to ignore it as much as he can, even as he realizes he’s subconsciously put on Clint’s stolen jacket _again_.

“Oh, sweet baby,” Clint breathes in a reverent voice.

For a second Bucky thinks Clint’s referring to him but instead Clint moves further into the room and drops to his knees so he can reach out bandaged fingers to a still-wailing Alpine, who goes ominously silent when he gets in range.

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” Bucky says hesitantly. “She’s kind of-”

Well. Kinda of murderous, really. Bucky loves her, but he has to admit she’s a bastard of an animal - Steve jokes that she takes after Bucky himself, which is a fair criticism. He starts cringing as Alpine waits patiently for Clint to get within range, a bloodthirsty gleam in her eye.

“Aren’t you beautiful,” Clint says, cheerfully oblivious to the danger he’s willingly put himself in.

“Clint,” Bucky tries again in a warning voice as Alpine takes a step closer. His warning isn’t heeded in the slightest, and then-

She starts purring.

Wait, what?

“Who’s a gorgeous little baby,” Clint croons.

Bucky starts reassessing his entire life in that moment because his horrible murder cat is now sitting in Clint’s lap and knocking her head against his fingers for more pets. She looks like she’s come across a slice of heaven and all Bucky can do is stare in shock.

Well, now he knows for sure that something isn’t right about Clint Barton.

“Do you have coffee?”

“I, uh,” Bucky says. “I guess?”

“Good stuff,” Clint says as he sets the cup down on the coffee table. He’s lying. It’s probably to be polite, but Bucky knows that there’s no way in the world that it tastes any good because he buys the cheapest coffee possible and then never drinks it.

“Uh huh,” he responds anyway, stamps down the urge to shift away on the couch.

They’re sitting close enough that Clint’s knee is pressing against Bucky’s thigh; he’s sitting cross-legged so Alpine can sprawl in his lap more comfortably, her head rubbing against his leg as he pets her. Bucky’s still bewildered by how affectionate she’s being, but he can’t say it doesn’t make him feel a little less worried about this whole situation.

“I bullied Stark about that arm for you,” Clint says. “Did he get in touch?”

“Yeah,” Bucky says. “Gave me a roomba instead.”

“He gave you a what?”

As if on cue, the roomba comes trundling out from the bedroom, heading past them to pick up the empty cup.

A normal roomba wouldn’t be able to hold onto cups - balance them on top maybe, but this particular roomba has been given a pair of long metal arms. It takes the cup and then rolls off towards Bucky’s kitchen counter, making small beeping noises to itself as they watch. Alpine springs off of Clint’s lap to chase after FDR.

“Yeah,” Bucky says. “Don’t know why he thought that’d be an appropriate replacement for an arm, but there it is. ‘s called FDR, apparently.”

“Like the President? Weird.”

“I was going to return it,” Bucky says. Truth is, he’d feel bad packing it up in a box now. It’s almost like having a second, slightly more helpful cat.

“Huh,” Clint says. There’s a single piece of hair that’s sticking straight up on his head. It looks silly and hilarious and Bucky’s struck with the oddest urge to smooth it down for him.

He looks _human_.

There’s no way in hell that he _is_ human, though. Not completely.

Bucky still likes him.

Fuck.

“Anyway, I didn’t come here to steal your cat and your coffee,” Clint says, twisting around to face Bucky. He’s got white hair all over his shirt and jeans now and it’s funny in an endearing sort of way. Honestly, Bucky would probably let him steal his cat and his coffee on a regular basis if he wasn’t having dreams about Clint shedding his skin like a snake to eat Bucky for breakfast.

Clint wouldn’t do that.

Would he?

“What’s going on?”

“What do you mean?”

“You stopped texting me and when I saw you at the store you were acting weird,” Clint says, cocking an eyebrow at Bucky like it’s obvious. It probably is obvious. He’s noticed. Of course he’s noticed, he’s Hawkeye. _Shit_. “You’re always a _little_ weird anyway, but-”

Bucky kisses him.

There’s a hint of ethical _wrong_ ness attached to kissing someone simply as a distraction, but he’s panicking. It’s the first thing his frazzled brain had thought of - and he should _really_ stop what he’s doing and pull back, fucking apologize for this whole mess and come clean about his paranoia surrounding Clint’s humanity.

He should stop, and he’s _going_ to, except that Clint chooses that moment to start kissing him back.

Turns out Clint’s stupidly good at using his mouth as well as his hands. Bucky’s brain whites out a little as Clint pushes him back into the couch cushions in one smooth movement, still keeping their lips connected as he does. His body is warm and solid where he’s pressing up close, firm muscle and hot skin under the hand Bucky’s got braced on his chest.

Somehow it doesn’t feel oppressive - usually he’d be getting the hell out of dodge by now because this is the definition of being trapped and Bucky’s brain _hates_ that but instead he’s tipping his face up for more. He can’t remember what he was upset about.

Clint’s hand is on his thigh, closer to his knee than his dick. It’s oddly polite compared to the things Clint’s tongue is doing in Bucky’s mouth.

“Can I-” Clint says, breaking away for a second, and all Bucky can think is _yes, more, yes, whatever you want_.

Bucky clenches his fingers in the fabric of Clint’s shirt and tugs him back until their mouths meet. Clint doesn’t put up any resistance himself; he’s strong enough that he could definitely back out if he wanted to, so Bucky doesn’t feel bad about being demanding.

He loses his thoughts to the sensations of his body - vaguely he wonders if these impulsive decisions are going to be a running trend with him and whether they’re healthy or not, but he’s enjoying Clint’s touch far too much to think about it any deeper than that.

Clint’s fingers squeeze his knee briefly and then let go, the warmth of his skin disappearing for a moment before it reappears against Bucky’s side, pressing against his ribs.

It’s almost the same spot Bucky had seen the fae stab him, and the thought makes him jolt.

Unfortunately he moves hard and fast enough that Clint goes tumbling off the couch, and they’re tangled enough that it drags Bucky down on top of him.

“Shit,” Bucky says.

“I’m fine,” Clint answers immediately, like he’s worried it’ll ruin the moment. Given that he somehow survived a knife wound Bucky doesn’t really doubt it, but his knee-jerk reaction is still to cup the back of Clint’s head to feel the short hair there. No blood, thankfully, but Clint still winces a little.

(Is he playing it up for Bucky’s sake or is he actually in pain?)

“Stay there. Just… stay right there,” Bucky says, takes in Clint’s tousled hair and swollen mouth. His own mouth is tingling and he’s unable to stop his gaze from drifting away from Clint’s face, down to where his t-shirt is riding up to expose his abs. Fucking _hell_.

Clint does stay where he is and Bucky’s turned on but he’s also curious, and the burning urge to find out _more_ wins over the urge to have sex with Hawkeye on his apartment floor, although not by much. He’s subtle about it - has to be, because he’s still not entirely sure where this is leading, so he shifts back a few inches before he moves his hand to push Clint’s shirt up higher, copping a feel while he’s at it.

Bucky can feel Clint watching him so he tries to pull on a casual face, pretends he’s simply admiring the view as he slides his fingers up Clint’s side. It's not entirely a lie anyway. (Fuck, he's hot.) There’s a scar exactly where he’d expected a wound to be, faded like it’s been there for a long time. Bucky’s had worse from falling off his bike as a kid.

Right. Okay.

He’s got a decision to make here.

“So you can see weird things now?”

“I guess,” Bucky says, shifting on the bed so he can face the other occupant. Thankfully the sheets cover most of Clint’s chest, so he doesn’t get too distracted. “It started a couple of days after you got me out of that shop.”

“Huh,” Clint says, scrubs a hand through his hair. “Is it everyone, or…?”

“Don’t think so. It’s only happened a few times,” Bucky admits.

Clint points a finger at him accusingly and Bucky’s heart skips a beat. “ _That’s_ why you’ve been so weird. Did you find out someone you know is a fae or something? Spill the deets, Barnes, I want to know.”

“I saw a girl and her eyes were liquefied,” Bucky blurts instead of answering the question. “Dripping down her face and everything. I had to leave the grocery store before I threw up.”

“Gross. Glad I don’t have to put up with that.”

“You… can’t see them?”

“Nah,” Clint says, rolls onto his back and looks at the ceiling. “Not unless I’m in their realm, and even then they’re pretty elusive. Most people, you only see what they want you to see. Looks like you’re special.”

“I don’t want it,” Bucky says.

“Perfectly understandable,” Clint tells him. Then turns his head to look at Bucky, eyes still as blue as ever. “What do you see when you look at me?”

Bucky hesitates.

He thinks about telling Clint what he saw. About the little things that just don’t add up no matter how he frames them, about the scaled person and the knife and the way the world feels warmer whenever Clint’s around. He doesn’t know if the last one is even supernatural, to be honest.

“Just you,” Bucky says. “I just see you.”

“Probably be hotter if I turned into something monstrous,” Clint says thoughtfully. “Hey, how do you feel about snuggling? Never did get that opportunity that first time we shared a bed.”

“I’m okay with it,” Bucky says, squirming a few inches closer so he can press his cheek up against Clint’s bare chest. He can’t tell if he’s gotten away with the lack of information or not. He doesn’t even know why he’s avoiding talking about it, or why he’s entangling himself further in Clint Barton’s clearly abnormal life when he’s already got a shitshow of his own.

Clint’s arm curls around his shoulders, though, and it’s peaceful.

He's got a heartbeat, at least.

It’s nice.

“Are you gonna eat me?”

Bucky didn't mean to say that out loud.

“Like in a sexy way, or - ? No offense, but I don’t think you’d taste that great if I cooked you up for a stew,” Clint replies, trailing careful fingers down Bucky’s ribs. “Still kinda craving that Big Mac, to be honest.”

“Hm.”

“I can ask around,” Clint offers quietly. “If you want to get rid of the sight. Can’t imagine what it’s like dealing with that on top of everything else.”

“Maybe,” Bucky says.

“Unless…”

“Unless what?”

“I mean,” Clint says slowly, like he’s not sure if he should be saying it out loud. “You’re frustrated because you can’t do the stuff you used to, right? Don’t like Steve as your sugar daddy?”

“What’re you suggesting?”

“People who can see things, we use them as consultants when we cross over for Avengers-related business,” Clint says. “But then you’d probably see Amora again, and who knows what else you’d find. It’s a bad idea, you’re already traumatized by what you see now. Don't worry about it.”

“No,” Bucky says. Helping people. Sounds like an alien concept, now. It probably _is_ a bad idea, but- “I - if I’m not going insane, I’d. I’d be open to trying.”

“Me ‘n Steve’d come with you,” Clint says. “He’s probably going to give me the shovel talk again, though.”

Bucky lifts his head. “He gave you a shovel talk before?”

“That first time, when we lied about why you were in the Compound,” Clint answers. “Gave me this whole speech about how you were vulnerable and still recovering from trauma and all that.”

“That didn’t scare you off?”

“I mean,” Clint says. “You _could_ be all of those things, but you’re still allowed to make your own decisions. Shitty as some of them are - I'm talking about the whole fae store arm replacement thing, not us, by the way. Hopefully I’m not one of the bad decisions.”

“Hopefully,” Bucky agrees.

When he gets up in the morning, Clint doesn’t have a shadow.

Bucky turns on the coffee machine and directs the roomba to get two cups.


End file.
